


Carribean Calypso

by Amberdreams



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Case Fic, Drag Queens, M/M, Season/Series 03
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-29
Updated: 2013-10-29
Packaged: 2017-12-30 21:31:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1023601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amberdreams/pseuds/Amberdreams
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Sin City, Sam and Dean take a case on a cruise to the Carribean, thinking it’s going to be a bit of light relief from trying to figure a way out of Dean’s deal.  Even the fact that they have to masquerade as drag queens to blend in with the convention on board the cruise ship doesn’t put Sam off.  But the case turns out more complicated than they expected, the monster they are hunting is an ancient being who is hungry for life and has set its sights on Dean.<br/>There’s angst, first time sex, and Winchesters in drag.  What more could you want?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Carribean Calypso

**Carribean Calypso  
Part One**

 

Sam was trying not to worry, but that seemed to be his default setting these days.

Dean had been subdued since Richie’s death.  Not unusual behaviour for someone who was grieving, but Dean’s normal coping strategy was piling on the bluster, getting louder and even more obnoxious to cover up his feelings.  This time he was quiet, almost distracted.  So much so that he even let Sam fuss over his colourfully bruised ribs without a protest, and never said a word in protest when Sam gratefully accepted Bobby’s invitation to come back to Sioux Falls to recuperate for a while.

After a day or two, Sam began to wonder.  Perhaps this was nothing to do with the death of the flamboyant little hunter, even though it would be just like his brother to feel guilty for failing to prevent it.  Maybe Dean’s uncharacteristic behaviour was caused by something else that happened in Elizabethville, Ohio.

“What did you do with Casey, Dean?  All that time you were trapped down there with that demon, how did you pass the time?”

Sam hadn’t intended for this to come out like an accusation, but somehow his rational brain failed to communicate with his mouth and Dean’s sharp look rather indicated he wasn’t happy with Sam’s demanding attitude.

“Nothing, Sam.  What do you think we did?  Fucked? Danced a rhumba?  Exchanged sad stories about our fucked up childhoods and the death of kings?”

Sam cleared his throat, ignoring his frisson of surprise at Dean quoting Shakespeare.  “Well she was hot, Dean. You said so yourself, so…”

Dean looked at him in disbelief.  “She was a _demon_ , Sam.  I’m not going to get my joystick out and stick it in a black-eyed bitch.  She’d probably make it wither and drop off!”

Fortunately for the sake of Sam’s sanity, Bobby chose that moment to interrupt with news of a hunt in South Beach, Miami.  Distracted, Dean lit up like a kid who’d been offered free roller coaster rides for life.

“South Beach, Sammy!”  Dean threw his hands up in the air and waved them around, looking for all the world like a TV evangelist. Sam wasn’t going to mention it though. Well, not right this minute anyway.  He’d store it away for future reference instead.  Teasing ammunition was always useful, but for now he was just glad to see Dean’s spark was back.

“Somebody up there likes me after all, dude!”

Sam thought Dean’s grin could have lit a room.

After a week in South Beach and a very simple salt and burn, Sam was less happy about the return of Dean’s spark, and thoroughly tired of that grin.  In fact, he was bordering on the brink of snuffing it out with the sheer frustration that was building up inside him.  He had made no progress whatsoever in finding a way out of Dean’s deal, and Dean was still pretending that his clock wasn’t ticking.

So when the call came in from another old friend of Dean’s, offering a legitimate alternative to watching Dean ogling bikini clad bathing beauties on the wide sandy beaches of Miami, Sam was so grateful he could have hugged Russell Clark, whoever he was.  It was probably a good thing the guy was calling from New York, or he might have suffered a couple of cracked ribs.

Sam took the call while Dean was – otherwise occupied.  Again.  Having turned down the invitation by the girl to ‘ _make it a threesome, baby_ ’ - which had been disturbingly enthusiastically backed up by his inebriated brother - Sam found himself shut out of their motel room with nowhere to go but the Impala.  Lucky for Sam, South Beach in early October was still pretty balmy, even late at night, so at least he wasn’t going to freeze to death in the car.

Grumbling under his breath, Sam folded himself into the shotgun seat and flipped open his laptop.  The tension in his shoulders eased a little when he managed to find an unsecured Wi-Fi network.  Within seconds he was absorbed in his research.  Dean could protest and be as stupidly stoical as he liked about it, but one way or another, Sam was going to get Dean out of this deal.

He was jerked out of his research fugue by the grunge guitar chords of Smoke on the Water.  He nearly threw the offending cell phone out of the Impala’s open window, but thought better of it.  Grudgingly, he answered.

Twenty minutes later, Sam had a sketchy outline of the case, and directions to a ‘specialist’ outfitter in New Jersey, where they could pick up some of the supplies they would need for their cover.  He’d given the guy their vital statistics, though Russell Clark had been unexpectedly cagey about the details of their cover, just saying that Dean would understand, and that Sam would get the picture when they arrived in New York.  Normally Sam would have poked and prodded until he had all of the information, but he was so happy to have a case that would take them away from Miami and keep Dean occupied, he let it slide.

He didn’t even wonder about Dean’s exceptional good mood on the long drive from South Beach to New Jersey, putting it down to post coital bliss – albeit an unusually long lived kind of bliss.  That girl must have been something spectacular.

Really, he should have known better.  Dean was only ever _that_ happy when he was pranking Sam.

Which was how Sam came to be standing outside on West 39th Street, Manhattan, staring open mouthed at Planet Pepper’s dazzling spangled and multihued window display.  It really wasn’t the kind of outfitters he’d had in mind.  Dean’s expression was one of unholy glee, the kind Sam had only seen before in association with clowns.

“Come on then, princess. Time to see how you look in a tiara!”

Sam grabbed Dean’s arm and hissed in his brother’s ear.  “There must be some mistake. I must have taken the address down wrong.  No way can we be doing a case dressed as drag queens!”  
Dean’s grin just got wider.  “Oh, didn’t Russ tell you?  He’s also known as Raquel La Belle.  Used to lead a burlesque troupe over at the Little Palace Theatre just off Broadway.  He’ll be waiting for us inside.  Come on, Priscilla.”  
“What?  Wait…Dean, you do know Priscilla was the bus, don’t you?”  
“Shut up, Sam.”

0x0x0x0

Stepping inside Planet Pepper was like stepping into another world, one where there was no room for anything mundane, and every shade of every colour but grey.   They were greeted by a middle aged but lithe African American guy, who pounced on Dean as if the elder Winchester was a desert oasis and he hadn’t had a drink in a week.

“Dean, darling!  You’re as beautiful as ever!”  The guy released Dean and held him at arms length. Dean’s blush was adding a nice shade of carmine to the multi-coloured backdrop; luckily it didn’t clash.  Russell cocked his head to one side, considering, then made an exaggerated moue of distaste.

“Damn, girl.  All that gorgeousness and you still wrap it up in ill-fitting layers. What a shame your fashion sense hasn’t improved any over the years.”  The guy glanced over Dean’s shoulder at Sam, clearly finding his wardrobe just as lacking, if the despairing expression was any indicator, before flicking back to Dean.  He tugged at Dean’s over-shirt with finger and thumb.  “I mean, plaid shirts?  The faded rock t shirt might carry a tiny bit of street cred, but the plaid makes you look like a lumberjack.”

“Fuck you, Russ, you never did have any taste in clothes.  This is a classic look.”

Russell shook his head in mock despair, and Dean punched his arm with an easy camaraderie that surprised Sam somehow, even though he could see that the two were evidently closer friends than he’d realised.  Sam was trying to place Russell’s accent and failing.  It was New York alright, but there was a hint of something else in there that Sam couldn’t quite pin down.  He’d quizzed Dean during the long drive to Manhattan about the backstory to this mysterious friendship, but had gained nothing much, other than that they’d met on one of Dean’s solo cases in New York, while Sam was at Stanford.  But he knew there had to be more to it than that, because Dean was so eerily relaxed in the face of this whole drag queen scene. It was unbelievable. The noisily heterosexual asshole-brother Sam knew should be totally freaking out about this by now, and the fact that Dean wasn’t had Sam on edge far more than he liked to admit.

“Come on upstairs, boys.  I can see that Pepper is going to have his work cut out for him, fitting you two up.  We are going to have to get you some casual gear as well as the rest, I think.  Can’t have you wandering around the ship dressed like this.  You’ll stick out like sore thumbs!”

The fitting studio was upstairs, a small but airy room that felt like an artist’s loft, with one wall entirely covered in mirrors, intensifying the light from the high windows.

“Now tell me about this job, Russ.  What have you gotten yourself into now, you old Queen?”

“Not a Queen any more, Dean, I’m a manager now.  Got my own troupe of entertainers, playing the cruise ships. Which is why I called you in.  Something’s been killing my kids. Our ship’s due to sail in two days with the entire Imperial Court of the East Coast on board.  All my friends, colleagues, rivals…  I don’t want to lose anyone else to this thing, whatever it is.”

“Fair enough. Why do you think it’s our kind of gig, Russ?”

“Could be the fact that their hearts were shrivelled up inside their chests, not a mark on them otherwise.  That kind of gave me a clue.  And before you ask, yeah, I got hold of the autopsy report for the last one.  Raquel la Belle still has a following in the NYPD.  Thing is, I think this thing might have been around before the deaths.  A couple of my girls were acting strange on our last trip before anyone died, but one was in the middle of hormone treatment so we didn’t think anything of it; you know how they get when they are busy growing lady parts…”

Sam looked around in some trepidation, only half listening while Russell Clark filled Dean in on the case.  He’d already gotten most of the case details from Russell on that initial phone call, and right now Sam was wishing he’d asked for more about the whole cross dressing thing.  He stared, a little preoccupied with the intimidating selection of bouffant wigs he’d seen on display downstairs, and the even more terrifying array of pointy, shiny, sparkly shoes in the largest sizes Sam had ever seen, filling the cubby holes that lined the wide passage they’d walked through to get to Pepper’s studio.  He jumped like a startled gazelle when a voice interrupted from directly behind him.

“Are these my new Queens?  Raquel, darling, please say they are!”

Sam turned expecting the owner of the voice to be as flamboyant as the studio’s clients undoubtedly were, only to find a stocky, broad-faced, rather ordinary guy gazing up at him admiringly.  He assumed this must be Pepper.  He was right.

“Well, look at you.  Lord, but you are going to have to wear thigh high boots with those long legs.  Shame your hair isn’t a little bit longer or you wouldn’t need a wig.”

Sam flushed bright red while Dean guffawed.

“See?  I always told you your hair is too girlie, Sammy!”

“Huh, not girlie enough, it would seem,” Sam retorted, bristling.

Russell stepped forward and took charge.

“Pepper, this pretty loud-mouth is Winnie, and this tall streak is Samilicious.  They are joining the cruise with me on Saturday, so we only have a day and a half to get them glammed up from scratch.”

Clark ignored Dean’s squeak of protest at being called Winnie – _I’m not a frigging cartoon bear, Russ!_ – and before Sam could even think about protesting at being called Sami-anything, the two Winchesters were swallowed up in a flurry of activity.  Stripped to their boxer briefs they submitted to being poked and prodded and having their every physical attribute assessed and measured.  Pepper was very vocal about his disappointment that their time constraint meant no new designs could be aired to make their debuts as drag queens more memorable, something that Sam felt wasn’t so awful.  Somehow he thought that it was going to be memorable enough with the seemingly endlessly expanding pile of silks, satins and sequins that Pepper was putting together for them.

“No feathers, man,” Dean was saying, “You know how that shit makes me sneeze.”  Russell looked saddened as he put a white floaty contraption straight out of Ginger Roger’s wardrobe, trimmed with masses of fine white down, onto their ‘reject’ pile, while Sam was left wondering exactly what Dean had gotten up to on the case he’d worked at Russell’s theatre.

Then Dean was whisked away into one changing room, while Sam was locked into the other to try on the first of three outfits that Pepper thought were the best fits.

“I want to see you in this one first, darling,” Pepper said, pointing to the one costume that had terrified Sam the most.  That figured.  It was a dark red vinyl, leather and velvet corset attached to a skirt that was ruffled to hell, short at the front and long at the back.  But that wasn’t the part that scared Sam the most.  No.  It was the thigh high lace up boots that had him sweating.  
“Don’t worry, I’ll help you with the lacings.  Here,”  said Pepper, and Sam managed to flush even redder as he realised he must be telegraphing his discomfort.  It was particularly galling as Dean seemed to be taking all this in his stride, almost as if….

Sam sat down heavily as the thought struck him, and stared at the mirror in front of him with unseeing eyes, not even noticing Pepper’s competent hands swiftly untangling the long laces on the red leather boots.

Yeah, it was almost as if Dean had done this before.  Holy shit.  Dean must have dressed in drag before.  His overcompensating, outspokenly macho big brother was a cross dresser.  He was always glad to find ammunition for teasing Dean, but this little gem would give him enough material to torment Dean until he was a very old man…  The grin that had been growing on Sam’s face vanished as he remembered that Dean was not even going to make it to thirty. Suddenly the thought of teasing Dean about his newly discovered feminine side lost all its lustre.

“Are you alright?  You look a bit pale.”  Pepper was looking up from tying off the laces with a concerned expression.

“What?  Oh, yes, I’m fine.”

“Okay then, up you get and let me get your corset sorted.”

Sam rose and just kept going up and up.  He wavered, teetered and nearly over balanced as his feet settled into their new position and adjusted to the unaccustomed heels.  He grabbed Pepper’s broad shoulder with an exclamation of surprise.  Jesus.  How did Jess ever manage to look so elegant in her red Manolos?  Sam looked like a newly born foal trying to balance on heels half the height of hers.  Pepper gave him a wry smile.

“I take it you’ve never worn a costume like this before then, sugar?  This should be interesting…”

Pepper turned Sam around and started pulling the laces tight on the bodice until Sam was sure his creaking ribs were going to snap, then spun him back to check the effect in the full length mirror.  Pepper was talking, but Sam was too dazed to really take in what he was saying.  He looked shockingly _good_.  The boots, although they were only around 3 inches tall, made his natural height look even more imposing.  The corset had given him a waist and simultaneously crushed and pushed up his pectoral muscles so he looked as though he had breasts, albeit small ones.

“…and once we add the padded shorts and some chicken cutlets padding inside the corset to give you a more sexy cleavage, you’ll have curves to die for, Sami.  Like I said before, it’s a pity your own hair isn’t longer, but I think both of you are going to need some of my wigs.  Then there’s make up, and false eyelashes…So much to do with you girls, I wish I had more time! ”

Sam looked down at the top of Pepper’s head and wondered if it was possible to get vertigo from wearing high heels. He was interrupted by a piercing wolf whistle from behind and suffered his second shock of the day as he looked in the mirror and saw a fantastical figure approaching.

Somehow Russell had found the time to dress Dean up in the whole kit and caboodle – from the long blonde wig to the six-inch stilettos.  Dean even had his face made up, and if Sam hadn’t known it was his brother, he’d have been hard pushed to recognise Dean at all.  The dress Dean was wearing was an off the shoulder, dark green velvet sheath that hugged contours that shouldn’t have been there, and was split right up the side from hip to ankle, showing off all Dean’s long leg as he walked.  Okay, that leg was still a bit too hairy to be mistaken for a female and those shoulders were too broad and muscular, but then female impersonation wasn’t the kind of drag they were aiming for here.

Whatever, Dean looked absolutely fantastic.

Even if the effect was then ruined by Dean opening his mouth and talking.

“Look, Sam, I make a fucking amazing queen!  And with these heels on I bet I’m taller than…”  Dean’s voice trailed off as he took in the full effect of Sam’s costume.  Sam flushed when Dean stopped in his tracks and just stood staring at Sam, with his distractingly shiny reddened mouth hanging open in a most unladylike fashion.

“What?” Sam said, uncomfortable under the scrutiny.  “I look ridiculous, right?  I feel like a giraffe on roller skates.  I should just…”  He turned, wobbling in the boots, reaching to cover himself up with the old familiar plaid shirt he’d thrown onto the chair.  Then Dean was right there in his space, moving at a speed that shouldn’t have been possible, dressed like that.  Their bare shoulders brushed with a flare of heat, and Dean’s hand landed a firm grip on Sam’s wrist, stopping him dead.

“Don’t.”

Both of them froze, Sam suddenly intensely aware of how little clothing was covering either of them, and how warm Dean’s skin was, where it was pressed up against his own.  He thought he heard Dean swallow hard in the charged silence before Pepper blessedly interrupted, tapping Dean on the back.  The touch broke the tension between them before it became unbearable.  Or before Sam did something exceptionally stupid, like kissing his brother on those ridiculous, slicked up, bee-stung lips.

And what the fuck was that all about?

“So ladies, what do we think?  I have to find the right wig for Sami here, and beat the hell out of that face…,”

Predictably, Dean jumped right in to defend Sam at that, who was relieved to have something distract him from the lingering ghostly sensation of pressure on his wrist where Dean’s fingers had briefly rested.

“Hey!  Nobody’s beating Sam up, least of all you, shorty!”

Both Russell and Pepper dissolved into peals of laughter while Dean stood with his fists clenched and a bewildered expression on his face that was utterly adorable.  Not that Sam  noticed, of course.

“What’s so funny?” Dean said aggressively.

Gasping for breath through his laughter, Pepper turned to Russell, ignoring Dean’s indignant question.

“Raquel, darling, I thought you said this one had done this before?  He ain’t gonna make much of a drag mother for Sami if he can’t speak the language!”

“He was only with us for a couple of weeks, Pepper, give the girl a break.”  Russell took pity on Dean and explained,  “Beating someone’s face means making it up, Dean, not punching it.”

Dean flushed and glared at Sam, who was opening grinning.

“Yeah, well, I might not have learned all the lingo but at least I can walk in my heels.”

“Are you really going to claim victory because you make a better woman than I do, Dean?”

Sam didn’t bother to hide his amusement at Dean’s discomfiture, earning himself a harassed sounding  ‘shut up, bitch’.

Pepper rolled his eyes.  “Huh, I can see you two are related.  You can both pat yourselves on the back, darlings.  Neither of you would be a booger, even if it wasn’t someone with my incredible talent turning you into a couple of pretty heathers.”

Sam shot a glance at Dean and was not surprised to see that his brother was looking just as puzzled as he was.

“Okay.” Sam said. “I can see that we are going to need a crash course in the right patois as well as a few other things, before we set sail on this boatful of queens.  Better start with what a booger and a heather is…”

Three hours and what felt like a hundred costume changes later, Sam’s head was buzzing with new words and phrases, and Dean was getting dangerously bored.   Never a good thing, especially if the only outlet he had for alleviating that boredom was Sam.  Time to return to normal, slide back into the comfort of their scruffy jeans and well-worn plaid.  Sam was getting itchy for his laptop and research, and Dean needed some beer and pie to keep him quiet.  At least Sam wasn’t wobbling around on his high heels so much now; in fact he thought he could almost manage a bit of a sashay, as long as there was a wall close by to grab.

Even Pepper seemed half satisfied with their progress.  “Well hallayloo! I think we are just about there, girls!  Winnie looks fabulous as long as she keeps her pretty mouth shut, and if Sami promises to practise walking so she doesn’t look like it’s her first time on the ice, I figure we’ve got ourselves a pair of fierce queens, Russ my darling.”

Finally both Russell and Pepper gave their seal of approval.  The Winchester brothers were about as ready as the two experts could make them after such a short introduction to drag queen etiquette and dressing up.  Their intimidating selection of dresses, costume jewellery, make up and wigs were all packed up and ready to go.

Leaving with their new wardrobes carefully crammed in two of the biggest pieces of luggage Sam had ever seen proved almost as big a challenge as parking the Impala on a New York street had been.  Especially with Russell supervising the cramming.  Even though the ex queen was the jolliest person Sam had come across in a very long time, even Russell’s ever-lasting smile grew a little strained.  He fussed and clucked when Sam tried to fold something that apparently shouldn’t be folded, and nearly set off the nearest shop alarms in sympathy with his shriek when Dean spilled the second best wig onto the sidewalk whilst fumbling in his pocket for the keys to the Impala.

They had one night in Manhattan before embarking from Cape Liberty Cruise Point the following morning, so Russell had offered his apartment floor to sleep on.  As he also had a secure lock up for Dean’s baby, Dean had accepted with alacrity, though Sam was now convinced that Russell’s main motivation in offering was because he was more worried about making sure the Winchesters would fit in with the Imperial Courts of the East Coast Drag Queens, rather than needing the time to fill them in on the case.

Sam resigned himself to a long evening when Dean escaped Russell’s attentions making busy in the small kitchenette.  He only had two consolations.  First that he might be less at home in the drag costume than Dean, but he was going to sound more credible and had a better chance of understanding what was going on – always an advantage when investigating a new case.  Second was the totally awesome chilli that Dean whipped up out of nowhere.  He had to admit, his brother was full of surprises lately.

0x0x0x0

Dean concluded that checking in to a cruise ship was nothing like checking into a motel.  Luckily for the Winchesters, Russell’s privileged access as Entertainments Manager gained them a fast track through the registration process, and meant they could get settled into their cabin before the majority of the other passengers arrived.  Nearly the full complement of guests was from the Drag Queen community, making Dean snicker a little bit under his breath when he thought about the poor handful of unsuspecting holiday makers who were ‘normal’.  They were in for a bit of a shock.

Although the Empress of the Seas was a relatively modest size as far as cruise ships go, she was still a hundred times larger and more imposing than the tacky floating motel Dean had been half expecting.  His hunter radar was pinging like crazy.  He felt like a submarine diving deeper and deeper to avoid depth charges. He felt more and more claustrophobic as Russell led them down seemingly endless narrow corridors and sets of stairs to reach their cabin. The scarcity of exit options was making him sweat.

“Sorry you have to cram into the basic guest accommodation, boys, but it was the best I could get you at short notice.  This cruise has been fully booked for months, so I was lucky to be able to swing you a room at all…”

Dean gulp was audible as he took in the windowless so-called stateroom that would be their home for the next two weeks.  Calling it a stateroom was a joke because there was another word that was a lot more accurate, miniscule.  He had to give the designer credit for managing to fit the absolute maximum functionality into such a tiny space. Somehow they had crammed two twin beds in there, though the space between them was barely as wide as one of Sam’s giant feet.  There was what the brochure optimistically described as a ‘vanity area’, which consisted of a narrow dressing table type contraption with a large mirror surrounded by lights, and behind him was a door which, Russell informed him, led to their ‘en suite’.  On inspection this bathroom was only an inch wider than Dean’s shoulders, with just enough room to turn around.  Dean’s sense of claustrophobia was not being eased at all here.  Another door in the panelled wall turned out to be their closet, which given the huge array of costumes Pepper had pressed upon the two of them, was going to be overflowing before they’d even thought about unpacking their own small duffels.

Russell was grinning at their twin expressions of dismay.  He slapped Dean’s back heartily.  Or heartlessly, depending how you looked at it.

“If you think this is small, you should see the crew quarters.  Believe me, this is luxury.  Right.  I’ll leave you two lovelies to get settled in, I’ve got work to do.  Feel free to explore, get your bearings and then come find me at seven.  I’ll introduce you to my company and you can start your investigations. I’ll be backstage in the Theatre – backstage is on Deck Five, so don’t follow the signs as those take you to the seating area.  This is Deck Two, in case you lost count.”

With that Russell was gone, leaving the Winchesters to start trying to find the best way to manoeuvre around each other in the confined space.  It wasn’t easy.  There might have been a lot of swearing.

“Dude!  My foot!”

“Dean, get your elbow outta my face…”

“Ow fuck!”

“Okay, okay wait just a goddamn minute…”  Dean eventually jumped up onto one of the beds, staking his claim and sat there cross-legged like a freaking pixie while he waited for Sam to finish bumbling around.  Yep, two weeks of this was going to be fucking hilarious.  He sighed, but silently.  He wasn’t an emo princess like Sam, after all.

After they were both unpacked, the discussion turned from irritable bitching to the case.

“You know this ship is kinda like a small town, so I guess we just have to work it in the same way.  When all the guests arrive there’ll be over three thousand people on board, including the crew.  That’s a lot of potential monster chow.”

“A big crowd for a monster to hide itself in too,” Sam said.

“Yeah.”  Then Dean perked up.  “But on the bright side, Russell’s troupe has hot dancers, dude.”  He waggled his eyebrows suggestively and was rewarded with Sam’s best bitch face of the day.  Which, given the way the day had been going, was actually quite an achievement.

“Dean, you are not going to hit on those poor girls.  Or any of the passengers either.  Though with the way you pulled off the whole drag act, maybe you should be looking at the other side for a change.”

“Hey!  Low blow, man.  Just because I looked hotter in a dress than you did, there’s no need to get all bitter and twisted about it.”

“In your dreams, dude. What’s the background between you and Russell anyway?  You seem close.”

_Uh oh, here it came - deflect, deflect!_

“He’s a friend, Sam.  I do have a few of those, you know.”

“Okay, touchy.  If you don’t want to tell me, I’m sure I can find out.”

“Nothing to tell, Sammy.  I worked that theatre case for him while you were in Stanford, so I guess he’s grateful I saved some of his colleagues from dying horrible deaths.  It was one nasty poltergeist.  These things tend to be bonding experiences; surely you covered all that in Psychology 101.”

Dean glanced up at Sam from under lowered lashes, but he couldn’t tell if Sam was buying this or not.  He really didn’t want Sam digging too deep. He’d never hear the last of it if little brother found out that Dean had actually slept with Raquel before realising Raquel was actually Russell. Dean was probably more embarrassed about the fact that he’d failed to notice Raquel was really a man, than the fact he’d then gone on to knowingly have sex with Russell several times.  So sue him, he’d really liked the guy; and guy or gal, the sex had been stupendous.  A good fuck was a good fuck, after all, even though he didn’t usually swing that way.

He was relieved when Sam just nodded and finally changed the subject to something possibly even closer to Dean’s heart than sex – namely food.

“So do you want out of this closet (no pun intended) and go check out the restaurants?  There’s dining rooms on Decks Three and Four, and a restaurant and café on Deck Ten, where the swimming pools are.”

Dean was on his feet and scrambling over Sam’s gigantic body to get to the door before Sam could take another breath.

“You bet!  How many decks are there on this thing anyway?”

“Ten’s the top deck.”

“Holy crap that’s a lot of stairs…”

“Don’t worry Dean, you won’t get a hernia from too much exercise. There is an elevator.”

“So what are you waiting for?  Lead on, MacDuff.”

“You know that’s a misquote, Dean. It should be ‘Lay on, MacDuff, and…’”

Dean let Sam take point so he could grin unchecked behind Sam’s broad back.  Listening to Sam bang on about the abuse of Shakespeare was soothing.  Normal.

Which was not the word that sprang to mind as they explored the boat.  
 _It’s a_ _ship, Dean; a vessel this size is a ship not a boat…_  
 _Yeah, yeah thank you, Fred T Jane…_  
Around every corner was something spectacular. The range of colours of the wigs alone was dazzling, and Dean had never seen so many sequins in his entire life.  He was not going to mention it to Sam, but he was secretly glad he’d allowed his brother to bully him into wearing the casual clothes Russell had insisted they bring in addition to their drag queen costumes.  Even in these male model chinos and soft linen shirt he was feeling distinctly under-dressed.  There was nowhere to hide his gun, for starters, and, as he’d pointed out loudly and often while getting dressed, he looked like a pimp from Miami Vice.  He was carefully ignoring the irony that he’d made more fuss about wearing these dandified guys’ clothes than dressing up as a woman, though he was sure none of this had gone unnoticed by Sam.  That boy was too damn sharp sometimes. Sharp enough to cut himself, as Bobby would say.

And then Dean absolutely was not sliding into remembering how insanely sexy Sam had looked wearing those fuck-me boots, because that would just be wrong; so he was exceedingly glad when they bumped into Russell again, who offered to take them back stage to meet some of his performers.  That was just the thing Dean needed to distract him from strangely inappropriate thoughts about how good Sam’s legs would look if he waxed them… Sam was so obviously happy to start their investigations that Dean thought they would be safe from anything transvestite-related for a few hours. At least until all the partying started when the boat set sail.

When Dean had worked the case in the Palace theatre back in ’04, most of Russell’s troupe had been drag acts, including Russell himself (or rather Raquel herself).  So he’d been expecting a similar make up to the entertainment line up this time too.  He was pleasantly surprised to find that the cruise had booked a more mixed group of performers, even though (or perhaps because) the majority of their clients were drag queens.  Sam was rolling his eyes in seconds because Dean was in girl-heaven the moment Russell ushered them through the wings.  While Sam got to work questioning the best (male) friend of the last victim, Dean set about charming the two (female) lead dancers, who were gorgeous.  He wondered if they would be up for a threesome…then remembered the tiny space he had to work with in his cabin and rapidly reined in his imagination.  Okay, maybe not a threesome then.

Huh.  This was even worse than the usual restrictions of sharing a motel room with Sam.  Though perhaps there was somewhere back stage with a bit more room to test out their combined flexibility?  He’d be willing to bet that was a glint of interest he saw in the smile of the girl with the fancy tattoo that snaked over her shoulder and disappeared round the region of her small but pert breast.  And she was certainly very attractive with her huge dark eyes lined with kohl, and her long dark ringlets.  Skinny, like most dancers, but he was sure she’d make up for the lack of cushioning with other skills.

He counted it a success that when they left the performers Sam’s giant brain was stuffed with enough information about the mysterious deaths to keep him occupied all night, while Dean had a hot date backstage after the evening’s show, with the hopefully very bendy Seema Banerji.

0x0x0x0x0

Of course Sam wanted to brain dump all that information immediately afterwards, so Dean agreed to discuss the case - provided they could do it over food.  When Russell told them all their food was included, and Dean had seen the marvellous variety of restaurants and bars on board, predictably he wanted to sample everything.  Sam, equally predictably, was being bitchy about it.

“Dean, we are on this ship for fourteen days, you don’t have to try everything on the menu on the first day, you know?”

Dean just grinned through a mouthful of the most delicious crispy bacon bits.  He could barely see Sam over the top of the teetering pile of syrup-covered pancakes on the plate in front of him.  Meanwhile Sam was prodding at his bowl of fruit salad with a distinct lack of enthusiasm.  Dean felt vindicated.  That would teach his little brother to go for the so-called healthy options all the time.

“Dude, if all the food is like this, I’m gonna be in heaven for the next two weeks!”

“You’re going to be bursting out of that slinky number Pepper made you try on, that’s for sure.  You’ll end up looking like a fat juicy sausage with all the stuffing squeezing out of the skin.”

Dean stuck out his tongue and grinned again at Sam’s expression of pure disgust. Sometimes it was just too easy to wind his little brother up.

Still grimacing with distaste, Sam summed up the case so far. Dean half-listened in between groans of ecstasy as the flavours of salty bacon mixed with real maple syrup burst on his tongue in ways that should have been illegal.  This really was so much better than their usual diner fare.  He kinda loved this case already.

“So, Russell called us in after three deaths in total.  There were two deaths in his troupe on their cruise before this one, which was from San Francisco to Mexico.  The first fatality happened when they were a day out of Cabo San Lucas, so they had to make an early stop at Loreto to offload the body.  That was Harry ‘Henrietta’ Schmetter, one of the drag acts, found dead in his cabin an hour before their first night performance.  Then the second death was Arnie Jones, the lighting guy, who fell off his rig towards the end of that same voyage; so he was dealt with in San Francisco. Russell managed to get me the two autopsy reports, and they are weird. Definitely our sort of thing.”

“What’d they die of then?  Not heart failure and a broken neck, I take it.”

“Nope.  There wasn’t a mark on either of them, and Arnie was dead before he hit the ground. But when they were opened up, the coroners found the hearts were atrophied.  Dry and shrivelled, like they’d had all the life sucked right out of them.”

“Yup, that’s weird alright.”

Sam tapped his fork against his teeth and Dean found himself staring at Sam’s lips, thinking about how they’d look so much fuller with some pink lipstick on them.  Christ.  He really needed to get laid. By someone else.  Preferably female, without any hard lines or muscles that could remind him of Sam.

“So, we can rule out a lot of the usual suspects – this can’t be werewolves, or vamps.”

Dean nodded.

“Or a rugaru, or shifter.  But you said three deaths?”

“Yes.  The third is what made Russell think that whatever is causing the deaths is travelling with his company, not tied to the other ship, or any port they’d called into.  It happened just two days ago here in New York, so we don’t have any autopsy yet, but I guess from what Russell told me that this is going to be the same thing.  Danny Dixie was Russell’s lead male dancer and from what his friend Twix told me, he was a real fitness fanatic, _my body’s a temple_ kinda guy, yet he dropped dead strolling down the street in Manhattan.  Twix said he had been behaving a little strangely the day before. He’d even collapsed at rehearsals though he appeared to recover afterwards.  Certainly everyone seems to think he’d been fine when he joined the rest of the company for an evening out on the town.”

“Okay, so what do you think we are dealing with here?  Some kind of ghost possession?”

“Not sure.  There was no talk about black goo, though, so maybe not.  I was wondering whether it could be voodoo, or some other kind of curse… I need to do some more research.”

Dean couldn’t help a grimace. Research.  Yeah, his favourite thing.  On the bright side, it did offer an excuse to spend some more quality time with the dancers, though.  This Dixie guy being their colleague and all. He just had to talk to them about the case, right?  If there was one thing Dean was good at, it was talking.  He made a mental note to chat to Seema about the late Danny Dixie after their liaison tonight.  No point in raising the topic of dead guys beforehand and harshing his mellow, after all.

0x0x0x0x0

The first night of Russell’s burlesque show was spectacular.  Sam was reluctantly impressed by the quality of the dancing and the music, while it was evident that Dean was more than slightly distracted by some of the contortions the lead dancer, Seema Banerji, was making as she writhed around the pole set centre stage.  That core strength was impressive, and had Dean not so subtly adjusting himself in his chinos and muttering under his breath about what she might be able to do using those kind of moves in bed.

“Dean!  We are not here so you can get your rocks off.  We are on a case and you need to stay focused, alright?”  Sam said, though he could tell from the faintly glazed look in Dean’s eyes that he was wasting his breath.

So Sam wasn’t surprised when Dean disappeared after the big finale, and that definitely wasn’t a surge of jealousy that rippled through him at the thought of his brother getting naked with some super-flexible slutty dancer.  He was just irritated that Dean wasn’t pulling his weight on this investigation, that’s all.  He nursed his beer and tried to concentrate on finding out as much as he could about Danny Dixie, while suppressing every thought of the way Dean’s lips had glistened when glossed up, and how dark and sultry Dean’s eyes had looked after the application of eyeliner…

Fortunately for Sam’s peace of mind, he uncovered a treasure-trove of intelligence when he started chatting to the resident beautician and tattoo artist, Culpho.  Tapping the small Mexican for information rather than his brother for well, for anything at all, was a much safer way to pass the evening.

And Culpho was a veritable goldmine for gossip.  People treated his salon like a confessional, without the inconvenience of signing any divine confidentiality agreement, and it seemed the Mexican was only too happy to share his customers’ deepest, darkest secrets with a stranger.  Sam did a mental eye roll, reminding himself not to spill anything even slightly juicy while talking to the guy.  He didn’t want his or Dean’s business spread all over the ship, thanks very much.

Filtering out the real gold from the fool’s gold was a challenge, though Sam did glean a few precious nuggets.  Like the fact that Seema and Danny had been an item, which was a surprise because he’d gotten the impression from Twix that Danny had been more than just a good friend to the set designer and artist.  Of course, it was entirely possible that the deceased dancer had been dallying with both Seema and Twix, which would complicate things slightly.  Two-timing relationships were liable to get very messy, very quickly, without the addition of any supernatural elements.

“Yeah, they were real close.  We’d all thought it was true love, you know?  They’d even gotten matching tattoos.  Not from me, though why they didn’t come to me to have it done, I don’t know.  It’s crazy to get these things done in ports, there’s no guarantee those local studios are hygienic, eh cachorro?”

Sam raised an eyebrow at being called a puppy by a guy at least a foot shorter than him, but refused to be distracted from his line of questioning.

“She doesn’t seem too cut up about Danny’s death, does she?”

“I know, right?  Everyone’s been talking about it.  Either she’s a totally hard hearted bitch (that seems to be most people’s personal favourite theory) or she’s in a denial so extreme she’s a negative image of herself, mi corazón.”

“I take it she’s not very popular, then?”

“Like I said, hard hearted bitch.  Mind you, she wasn’t always that way, used to be sweet as honey…” Culpho trailed off, his dark eyes taking on a suspiciously tearful glitter.  “Danny was besotted with her and now she’s behaving as if he never existed.  It’s just not right.”

Sam hoped Dean wasn’t planning to get up close and personal with Seema, though he rather feared the exotic-looking dancer was top of the bill for Dean’s after-show entertainment that evening.  He was starting to wonder if she might have been involved in these deaths in some way.  Certainly, the lead dancer had been with Russell’s company long enough; she’d joined them two years ago.  But if it was her, why would she suddenly start the killings now?

Culpho was too upset after that for Sam to get anything more useful out of him, and Sam had to settle for listening to the soulful vocals of the West Indian singer, Irie Jay, who had stepped into the spotlight while the dance floor was overtaken by slow dances.  Seeing all the couples smooching under the scattered shards of light thrown by the disco ball had Sam’s thoughts drifting into dangerous territory again.  For once Sam refused to think, to analyse, to unravel what he was feeling.  Instead he fled.

Back in their tiny cabin that somehow managed to feel too big without Dean in it, Sam took a long time to fall asleep.  But late as it was when he finally succumbed to slumber, his brother hadn’t returned.

0x0x0x0x0

In spite of rolling into bed at three am, Dean woke before Sam and took advantage of the fact by taking possession of the tiny bathroom.  He left to door open.  It served the dual purpose of preventing his claustrophobia and hopefully grossing Sam out when his sleepy brother eventually woke up.  It worked on both counts.

Dean watched Sam unfold his long limbs and staggering out of bed intending to slam the door shut.  Instead Sam stopped in the doorway, seemingly mesmerised by the sight of Dean’s naked back.

“Just how drunk were you last night, Dean?”

“What? Why?” Dean spat toothpaste noisily into the sink and then shot a grin over his shoulder at Sam’s grimace that he knew would be there.  His little brother had been uncharacteristically quiet last night, and had worn a peculiar expression that looked to Dean like a cross between disapproval and pain.  He hadn’t been sure what to make of it but he wanted to see it gone this morning.  Provoking Sam into straightforward annoyance was more comfortable in its familiarity.

 “Have I got lipstick somewhere it shouldn’t be?”

Sam shook his head. “Not exactly.  But there is that.”  His voice was a mixture of censure and amusement as he prodded Dean in the centre of his naked back.  Hard.

“Ow, dude! Careful with the merchandise…” Dean tried to crane his neck to see what Sam was poking.  Sam, the bitch, just laughed at his contortions as he twisted himself into a pretzel, all in vain.  Finally taking pity on him, Sam dragged Dean out of the tiny cubicle that constituted their ‘en suite’ and plonked him in front of the larger mirror in their equally tiny cabin.  The same mirror that Dean had declared made the cabin look like a drag queen’s dressing room because of the lights that framed it.  Which of course was actually only a factual statement, given that their cover was drag.

Sam spun Dean around so his back was visible in the glass and prodded the offending area again.

“That!” Sam said.

Dean’s mouth literally dropped open as he took in the fist-sized but perfectly formed tattoo that nestled between his shoulder blades.

“Fuck.  I got a tattoo?”

“Looks like.”  Sam chuckled.  “You don’t even remember the needles?  After all the fuss you made when we got our anti possession tats I find that hard to believe!”

“Fuck you, Sammy.  That shit _hurt_!” Dean stared at the offending article with a frown.  “What the hell is it anyway?”

“Looks like an Oroboros.  Or maybe…” Sam leaned in closer until his breath was tickling Dean’s bare back, raising goosebumps.  “Those look like feathers, so it could be Quetzalcoatl.”

“Gesundheit!”

“Very funny, Dean.”

“No really, that’s just peachy.  I’ve got ink on my back that looks like a sneeze.”

Sam rolled his eyes again.  Dean could see a lecture was coming, but there was no escaping it; their cabin was so cramped that moving around it was like learning how to ballroom dance. Every time one of them wanted to go somewhere, they had to manoeuvre around each other in a complex step sequence, being oh-so-careful not to touch.  It was virtually impossible for two guys their size.  So far Dean had lost count of the number of times Sam had trodden on his foot, or elbowed him in the ribs, or just brushed his naked chest to Dean’s naked back – which he so wasn’t thinking about.  Dean of course was far more graceful and coordinated than his gigantic brother.  Even though it was Sammy who’d been strutting his stuff on the dance floor with the “ladies” last night. That wasn’t talent, that was just Sam being freakishly tall, and good looking enough to blind any wannabe dancer to any missteps.

Before Sam could launch into the no doubt very edifying history of the Orob-thingy or the feathered sneeze, Dean had a thought.

“Hang on, Sammy.” He tried to point at the tattoo but his elbow wouldn’t bend that way, so he gave up.  “How come it isn’t all red and sore if I had it done just last night?”

“Mmm, good point.”  Sam leant in to get another close look, and Dean squirmed at the lack of personal space.  Sam’s breath was warm against his skin, and perversely, it made Dean shiver.  He could have sworn that he could feel the tattoo squirm as if it too was reacting to Sam’s proximity.  Which was just ridiculous.  As was the fact that he didn’t know if he was relieved or disappointed when Sam withdrew.

“I think we should go and have a word with Culpho.”

“Culpho?  Who’s that?”

“The beautician slash tattoo artist on Deck Nine.”

“Oh great.  Just don’t expect me to get a manicure while we’re there.”

Dean got dressed after the obligatory fussing about what he was willing to wear from Pepper’s casual wardrobe.  He outright refused to appear in public in the black drainpipe jeans and tight fitting sequinned black wife-beater, shutting Sam up by asking his brother exactly why Sam was so keen to see his ass in those anyway. Finally he settled on a pair of linen pants and a soft cotton shirt that were at least neutral.  Grinning at Sam’s annoyed huffing, they made their way to Culpho’s beauty salon.  Which was, predictably, heaving with queens.  Face packs, make overs (or beat ups, Dean supposed), pedicures and manicures, massages, the list seemed endless.  Culpho’s wall calendar was covered in multi-coloured glittery stickers, and his two beauticians were looking frazzled already.

“And it’s only ten AM, darlings!”

The Winchesters had to wait an hour before the small Mexican had time to see them, by which time Dean was climbing the walls with boredom.  However, he wasn’t so far gone when Culpho finally came over that he didn’t notice how the little Mexican brightened up when he saw Sam.  The flash of anger that accompanied his amusement at seeing how the short guy had to crane his neck to look up at Sam took him by surprise.

0x0x0x0x0

**Part Two**

_He’s soaring above the city, the thin air caressing his skin.  Some small part of him is filled with wonder that he feels no fear, being so high.  He doesn’t even know how he can be flying, because even though he has feathers, he has no wings.  Instead he seems to be progressing by undulating his snake-like body, moving through the air as if it’s water. It feels good.  Natural.  The sun is warm on his back, the sky the kind of brilliant blue he’d only seen in the warmer states, like California.  For some reason, remembering the Sunshine State makes him feel melancholy, though he has no idea why.  He gazes down at the city spread out below him and wonders why it looks wrong.  He’s expecting to see condos and high-rises, factory units and highways full of traffic, but this place is different.  Mile after mile of canals and low, flat-roofed houses interspersed with wide avenues leading to huge square stepped pyramids.  Temples, he thinks.  He knows this place._  
 _Tenochtitlan.  His city._  
 _He feels a cool breeze stirring his feathers.  Behind him, heavy dark clouds are gathering, but instead of apprehension at the thought of being caught in whatever tempest is brewing, he feels exhilaration and a sense of joyful anticipation._  
 _His brother is coming, riding on the storm winds and the lightning.  When they meet, they will join, and be whole again._

Dean woke up with a start, disoriented by gravity, by the strange heaviness of his limbs, the weight of the comforter that had tangled itself around his foreign-feeling legs, tying him to the ground. He had a moment of sheer panic before his heart slowed and he settled back into his own skin.  He groped for the tattered shreds of his dream, but it was gone, dissolved by the familiar smells of two grown men in close proximity, and by the soft sound of Sam snoring.  The surge of emotion that swept over him as he registered Sam’s presence was so overwhelming it took his breath away.

It was a heady mixture of love, lust and relief that completely distracted him from the strange burning sensation that was prickling across his back. He was horrified that his usual morning wood seemed to be more interested in thoughts of inappropriate sex with his little brother than memories of the scorching hot times he’d had with Seema, or any other chick for that matter.  It sent him staggering to the bathroom as fast as he could manage on weirdly wobbly legs.  Though banging one out in a shower stall where his shoulders touched two sides at once was not a pleasant experience.

As the day wore on, all memory of his bizarrely vivid dream was lost in the normality of their investigation routine.  Sadly, half the people they needed to talk to were night owls, and unlikely to make an appearance until the evening, which made Dean extra annoyed by the fact that he’d been wide awake and buzzing at seven in the morning.  If there were a couple of occasions during the day when he’d felt ill at ease in his own skin, he put it down to having too much caffeine and too little sleep. He knew he was being extra grouchy with Sam, but he couldn’t seem to help himself.  He was on edge and didn’t know why.

That evening there was a ball in the largest of the three dining rooms, and though Dean grumbled, he knew it was a great opportunity to catch their chief suspects with their guards down.  Russell’s troupe would not be on stage tonight, but mingling with the guests on the dance floor.  The trouble was, this meant biting the bullet and dressing up, and Dean didn’t know how he was going to cope with seeing Sam in his full drag queen regalia again. Then there was the disturbing fact that Sam needed help getting into that costume, and the only person available to assist was Dean.

And Dean wanted to help, if helping meant he could touch Sam.  He wanted that badly.

All day, he’d been fighting the urge to be close as possible to his brother.  He had been resisting the constant need to put out a hand to make sure Sam was still there, was still warm and breathing, as if the evidence of his own eyes wasn’t enough anymore.  It was disorientating, disturbing.  It felt like an echo of the terrible emptiness and terror he’d felt when Sam died, when his little brother’s turgid body had been lying on that stained mattress while Dean fell apart in the room next door.  As if at any moment he could lose Sam again, and this time he would never get his brother back.  Part of him knew that it was his own fault, because this time it was him who would be leaving, and it was his choice.

He supposed it was time they went back to their cubbyhole of a cabin and started choosing their dresses for the ball, and that had to be one of the most weird-ass things Dean had ever thought of doing, in a whole lifetime of weirdness.

His hands shook, just a little bit, when he helped Sam into that red and black corset, Sam’s skin hot as coals under his fingers, agitating the staticky unease under his own skin.  He steadied Sam as he stood tall in those fucking awesome red leather boots, those long legs going on for miles, and submitted without a word to Sam’s sure touch with the eyeliner pencil when Sam offered to beat-up Dean’s face.  Dean was wearing the shimmering black sheath dress Sam had picked out for him, in spite of his previous sausage-related remarks, so Dean guessed he looked okay.  Either that or Sam was being a bitch so he’d look good next to his lumpy brother.  Dean’s outfit was finished off by red shiny stilettos that made the two of them look coordinated.  Complementary.  Different but matching.  It felt right.

As they entered the ballroom, Dean could feel the attention of the room snap into focus on them, and a small part of him relished the impact they were making.  It was weird and should have felt uncomfortable when he was so used to working under the radar, slipping in and out anonymously, but he was kind of proud of how striking Sam looked, and knew he looked pretty stunning too.

After a few moments Dean looked around, feeling like he’d lost some time somewhere.  He found Sam immediately, over by the bar talking to Culpho.  Sam was perched somewhat awkwardly on a bar stool, clearly still too uncomfortable in the drag queen get-up to move with any great ease, but considerate enough to not want to tower over the smaller guy.  Nothing strange there, but some part of Dean wasn’t satisfied, was still scanning the room searching for something, or someone – a missing element of himself that he needed to find.  Which made no sense. His brother was right there, and that was the only thing Dean ever needed to feel complete.

Dean spotted the dancer, Seema, chatting with a good-looking guy – who was he again? The one with a puppy dog look that put Sam’s to shame …oh yeah, Twix like the candy bar.  What a stupid name for a choreographer slash artistic director.

Seema saw Dean and her dark eyes lit up.  She beckoned him over and tugged him down onto the stool between her and Twix, who was looking at Dean with a strangely hungry expression on his face that made Dean shiver and look twice at the colour of the guy’s eyes, just in case.  Nope, nothing demonic or hinky there, they were shrewd and honey-brown and normal.  Twix’s smile looked genuine enough as Dean leaned on the bar next to Seema, so Dean shrugged it off as the guy just being annoyed that Dean had butted in, and turned his attention to the lithe dancer.  The strange restlessness he’d felt earlier had disappeared and he settled down for the evening, ready to deploy all his considerable charms on the pretty dancer.  She certainly didn’t seem at all put off by the drag queen get-up, in fact she was remarkably eager to peel off some of Dean’s layers and go for a repeat experience with what he was packing underneath. Dean was very happy to oblige, and welcomed her invitation to slip back to her cabin, leaving Sam to his investigating.

What? He was on the case too.  He just worked in different ways…

Seema took his hand and tugged him off his stool.  He gave Sam a jaunty wave and threw a grin over his shoulder at Twix before heading across the heaving dance floor for the exit.  Funny, when he’d thought heaving, he hadn’t meant it literally, but after he’d taken a couple of steps away from the bar, it felt like the smooth surface under his feet was actually moving.  He thought for a moment that the weather had taken a turn for the worse. It was hurricane season, after all.  Maybe the boat was pitching about on rough seas, but looking around, nobody else was reacting to the way the floor felt like it was rising and falling.

Feeling a little nauseous, Dean took another step after Seema.  Immediately there was a peculiar tugging sensation in the middle of his back, as if someone had sunk a fishing hook into his flesh and was attempting to reel him in.

“What the…?” Dean muttered as he stubbornly took another step forward, only to find himself falling forward into darkness.

0x0x0x0x0

Dean opened his eyes.  He seemed to be lying face down on a polished wooden floor.  That was a little unexpected, and he wasn’t having much luck getting his brain in gear enough to work out why.  He was pretty sure he usually went to sleep in a bed, but hey, whatever.  He was on the floor now, and that probably meant he should be getting up and back to…Where the hell was he anyway?

He tried to lift his head to look around and found that he couldn’t move.  The first flash of panic rushed through his veins and he struggled and strained until he managed to give out the faintest of grunts.

“Dean!”

Sam.  That was Sam’s voice; something familiar and comforting.  Dean’s heart steadied a fraction from its frantic racing, and then Sam’s huge feet came into view.  At least he thought they belonged to Sam, but those kinky red pointy boots encasing his little brother’s size thirteens were a little confusing.  Hands were gripping his shoulders and then he was being turned over onto his back, Sam pushing away the many offers of assistance.

“Did she faint?”

“I bet she laced that corset too tight. Happens to me all the time, darling.”

Dean wondered who this fainting woman was they were all talking about, then remembered. Oh.  Yeah, that’d be him then. He was in drag and he’d fainted on the way to have bendy sex with that dancer girl.  Fuck.  How mortifying.

He blinked.  That was progress.

Sam’s face came into view, little furrows of anxiety between his brows.  Huh. That was kinda cute… though Sam could probably do with plucking those eyebrows. They were looking a bit unruly. The world tipped and Dean shut his eyes.  Whoa.  Dizzy.  When he risked opening them again, he was sitting upright, Sam’s body pressed up against his back, holding him in place.  It felt nice.  Warm.

“Dean.  Dean, are you with me?”

Well duh.  Of course Dean was with Sam.  Dean was always there. He wasn’t the one who kept leaving.  That’s what Sam and Dad were best at.  There was another dizzying lurch and Dean was on his feet before he had time to remember that he had booked a one way ticket to Hell in just a few months time, and that you couldn’t get any farther away from your little brother than that.  Seeing his own hypocrisy wasn’t Dean’s strong point even when his brain was firing on all cylinders, so he could be forgiven for ignoring it now, when he had something weird fuzzing up his thoughts.

He was vaguely aware of the hum of people talking, and the low beat of music playing. Everything was swirling around his head in a dizzying manner and he flapped a hand at it in irritation to get it to just stop already.  He leaned heavily on Sam, who was saying something about too much champagne with a laugh that even in his current state Dean could tell was strained and false.

Then somehow he had missed a chunk of time, because he found himself magically at the door to their cabin, seemingly in the time it took for him to register Sam’s arm sliding round his waist – _not a freaking girl, Sammy, dammit_ – and his own arm being slung around his brother’s shoulder in the ballroom. This was never going to work. Sam might be able to teach some of the old queens to tango but Dean wasn’t bendy enough to get those sweeping back movements right without cracking several vertebrae and besides, feeling this dizzy, he’d just end up in a heap on the floor, and oh, maybe that’s how it had all started. Had he been tangoing with Sam? Because if he remembered right, he’d just woken up on the floor, hadn’t he?

Before he could explore the puzzle of that, Sam had manhandled him through the door and there was another moment of swooping disorientation before he found himself lying on his back on the bed in an untidy sprawl of limbs.  He grunted irritably as Sam didn’t let him rest then, but knelt on the bed and rolled Dean onto his side.  What the…?  Oh.  The reason for the manoeuvre became clear when he felt Sam’s fingers unfastening the zipper on his black cocktail dress.  He’d completely forgotten he was all dressed up with nowhere to go.  He lay there in a fog of embarrassment as Sam undressed him with swift economy, moving Dean’s unresponsive body around like a doll. Any other time, Dean would have been making some snarky comments to cover his chagrin, but he hadn’t yet regained control of his vocal chords, and could only huff and moan a little, which he did a couple of times until he was hit with the realisation that it really sounded like sex noises, and he quickly shut up.

“What the…”

Sam seemed to have stopped the undressing, probably because Dean had no more clothing to strip off apart from his sturdy drag queen equivalents of tightie-whities, but that note in his little brother’s voice didn’t bode well.  Neither did the fact that this pause in proceedings had left Dean on his front, ass up and face mashed down into his pillow.  Apart from being undignified, breathing was quickly becoming Dean’s newest problem.  Cotton and foam were not air, and surely Sam was going to realise that Dean was close to suffocation soon, wasn’t he?  Because Dean could do fuck all about it right now.

Then all thoughts of breathing leaked out of Dean’s mind.  Sam was trailing warm fingers up his spine, and his already cool skin was shivering under the touch, inducing a giddiness of a totally different, more pleasurable order that made him want to moan his brother’s name out loud. And that was all kinds of wrong.  Even though nothing else was apparently able to move, his dick was reacting with considerable enthusiasm.  When he got full command of all his faculties again, he was going to have a stern word with his stupid cock about timing and _brothers_ and all that shit.

Luckily, or maybe not so luckily, all hint of inappropriate sexual arousal fled at Sam’s next words.

“Fuck, Dean.  That tattoo, it’s moved.  I can only see the serpent’s tail here on your back. It’s a lot bigger too…”  Sam trailed off as he grabbed Dean’s shoulders and flipped him onto his back, and thank Christ his erection had already wilted.  He could do without the added embarrassment of pointing a stiffy at his little brother.  The bonus was that he could now gulp in lungfuls of precious air and mumble a “Sam, what the fuck”, even though what came out sounded more like “Mm whh ff.”

Sam had heard a lifetime of Dean-speak though, and understood him perfectly.  He shoved a couple of pillows under Dean’s head, propping it up so he could stare down his own bare chest and see what Sam was talking about.

Well, shit.

The feathered serpent that had been nestled so small and neat just under his left shoulder blade wasn’t there any more.  Couldn’t be there, because here it was, on his chest.  It had grown, uncoiled and slithered up over his shoulder and was now positioned with its jaws opened wide around his anti-possession tattoo.  It was far-fetched to think a tattoo could be somehow alive, but he had to believe the evidence of his own eyes.  Absorbed in this impossible absurdity, Dean didn’t notice Sam’s intense scrutiny until Sam’s hands were on him again, tracing over the serpent’s path as it snaked over his collarbone and down his pectoral muscle.

Sam’s fingers felt hot, burning even.  If he could’ve moved, he would have flinched away from the touch that was trailing heat down his body, and not in a good way.  A prickling, searing burn was radiating out from every place Sam touched, and Dean was having difficulty breathing again, with no way of letting Sam know the distress he was in.  Just as he was starting to feel nostalgic for the numbness that had been gripping him previously, Sam removed his hand.

There was a final burst of intense burning energy that seemed to flare through his entire body and then the pain was gone.  Dean blinked tears from his eyes and took a deep shuddering breath.

“Fuck!”

His voice sounded hoarse but Sam looked at him as if it was the most wonderful thing he’d ever heard.  Dean sat up, shuffling backwards until the bones of his spine hit the chill of the cabin wall.  Every muscle in his body was vibrating. He was sweating like he’d done one of Sam’s ridiculous workouts, but otherwise, felt fine.  Absently he noticed that he was still wearing the red stilettos, though the rest of his drag costume was strewn haphazardly around the cabin where Sam had stripped him down to his hold-it-all-in underwear.  That was kind of kinky.

He stared at Sam.

“What the hell just happened?”

“I don’t know.  But touching the tattoo seemed to release you from whatever hold it had over you.  Assuming it is the tattoo that’s causing this.”

“The tattoo is _possessing_ me?”

“I don’t know, maybe…? I need to…”

“Do more research?”

That came out a lot snappier than Dean intended but hell, Sam wasn’t the one infected with an animated snake tattoo here.  Dean was wrung out, with all the strength of a wet rag, but with just one look Sam still managed to fill Dean with guilt for snapping at him.  Dammit.

“Okay, okay, I get it.  Go talk to whoever you have to talk to.  I’ll just…”  Dean flapped his arms at Sam in a shooing motion, discovered that his arms were actually made of lead, and let them fall back onto the bed.  “I’ll jus’ have a lil’ nap.”  He mumbled, his eyes already closing.  Jeez.  Being cursed or bewitched or tattoo possessed, whatever, was a tiring business.  He didn’t even notice Sam carefully covering him with a comforter, as he was sound asleep within seconds.

0x0x0x0x0

Sam stood watch over his sleeping brother for a few moments, making sure this was a natural sleep and not the tattoo taking hold again.  Finally satisfied, he scrubbed a hand through his hair while he thought about this whole situation.  Someone, or something, had to be controlling the tattoo.  But who?  And why?

Unless the tattoo itself was alive.

This case from the start had been too many questions and not enough answers, and while that had been a concern when civilians’ lives were at stake, now it was Dean’s life in the balance, and that had tipped the scale over to intolerable.  Sam didn’t know how much time he had to solve this, but he was sure there was none to waste.

A look of grim determination settled over his features.  The tattoo was definitely Quetzalcoatl. That was even more evident now it had gotten larger, and the design showing the feathers on the serpent was clearer.  Whether it had a life of its own (or was trying to get one by sucking its victims hearts dry), or was being controlled by someone or something else, Sam needed to find a weapon to kill the thing.  Somehow he knew their conventional hunting tools were not going to work in this case.  All the information he’d been able to glean about the ancient South American god pointed to Pre-Columbian weapons being their best bet, which meant something made of a stone like jade, flint or obsidian.

Sam’s eyes lit up as he remembered the gift shop on Deck Ten.  He was sure he’d seen a very beautiful black obsidian knife in amongst the display of mostly tacky Mexican souvenirs. The shop would be closed now, of course, but that was no problem for a resourceful Winchester with a well-used set of lock picks.

Sam wasted no time in turning the idea into action.  He was in and out of the small souvenir shop in minutes, thankful that the cruise company hadn’t thought to install an alarm system.  The knife was a work of art.  Its leaf-shaped blade was about six inches long and had an edge sharp enough to shave with.  Sam carefully slid the blade back into its leather sheath then slipped it down the front of his corset where it nestled invisibly between the whalebone staves of the bodice.

His next port of call would be the dancer, Seema Banerji.  She had been present both times something had happened to Dean, first the tattoo and now this shut down of Dean’s body.  Sam didn’t think for a moment Dean had actually fainted, however much he was going to tease Dean about it when all this was over.  A guy who had clung onto consciousness for hours when he’d had three broken ribs and a collapsed lung wasn’t going to fade away just from wearing a tight corset.  And Sam had noted how this affliction, whatever it was, had at least partially paralysed Dean.  There was no doubt about it. This was something supernatural, therefore it must have something to do with the creature they were hunting.

Sam chewed at his bottom lip with frustration, hating that he was no closer to finding out what this particular monster was than when they’d set foot on board the Empress two days ago.  He was not about to let some freaking monster outwit a Winchester.

When Sam arrived back at the ballroom, the party was in full swing and looked set to carry on all night.  The extra height the heeled boots gave him meant he could scan the room even more easily that usual, and he quickly discovered that the Indian dancer was nowhere to be seen.  He was about to leave when he caught sight of the guy who’d been with Seema and Dean earlier.  Twix.  Another one on this boat who didn’t seem to have a surname, just like Culpho.  Sam’s eyes narrowed.

He wasn’t sure why, but he felt drawn to the man, who seemed blissfully unaware of Sam’s towering presence.  Twix seemed totally absorbed in drinking an electric blue cocktail.  Forgetting all about his previous lack of confidence walking in heels, Sam strode quickly across the dance floor, ignoring pounding beat of the music and the flurry of queens he left in his wake.

Twix looked up at him when he arrived at the bar and smiled as if he’d been anticipating Sam’s arrival.

“Samilicious!  How’s Winnie? Feeling better, I hope.”

Sam opened his mouth. Shut it.

“It’s Sam.”  It wasn’t what he’d meant to say, but he couldn’t have anyone call him that ridiculous nickname. Not even…

“Who _are_ you?”

Twix’s smile never wavered.

“Who do you think I am?  Because I know who you are, Sam Winchester.  You are a hunter, and you are trying to stop me bringing my brother back.  I can’t allow that.”

Sam took a step backwards, suddenly uncomfortably aware that apart from the knife he needed to kill the serpent, he was unarmed, and worse, wearing a frigging dress.

“Don’t worry, Sam.  I’m not going to kill you, not here, and not yet anyway.  I have a proposition for you.  It’s about Dean’s deal.”

“We don’t make bargains with murdering monsters.” Sam said, but without conviction, and the creature’s mention of Dean effectively stopped him retreating any further.  “How do you know about Dean’s deal?”

Twix shrugged.  “Everybody knows. You’re famous, you Winchesters.  Hunters hate you for opening the doors of Hell, and demons talk about you all the time.  Especially you, Sam.  Azazel’s chosen one.”

The blood drained from Sam’s face but he stood his ground.

“Not chosen anymore, and besides, Azazel is dead.  What can _you_ do for Dean?”  He made no attempt keep the scepticism out of his tone.

“I can’t do anything, but my twin can.  If you and your brother help me bring him back.”

“Your twin?”

“Quetzalcoatl.  But you already knew that, didn’t you?”  Twix was looking at Sam with a calculating expression in his light brown eyes, as if he was assessing Sam and finding him lacking.  Unconsciously Sam straightened up to his full height, forcing the shorter man to tip his head back to maintain eye contact.  So this was Quetzalcoatl’s twin brother, Xolotl, god of lightning and death.  He was a lot prettier than the pictures Sam had seen in the sources.  At least this version had a human head and, Sam confirmed with a quick glance downwards, his feet were on the right way round.

“I suspected.” Sam said.

Twix nodded, satisfied, then slipped off the barstool.  He gestured dismissively at the sparkling bodies gyrating on the dance floor.  It was late, and several of the queens were looking somewhat dishevelled by now, wigs askew and make-up shiny with sweat.  He caught a glimpse of a grinning Russell grinding groins with a slim queen who looked like a younger, twink version of Ru Paul.  Sam had a fleeting thought that it was just as well Dean was out of it, and couldn’t make caustic comments about the DJ’s dubious taste in music as Abba’s Dancing Queen boomed out of the speakers.  Though he might have approved of Xolotl, since one of the god’s roles had been patron of ballgames.

“Let’s take this discussion somewhere quieter.” Twix said.  He grabbed Sam’s elbow and steered him towards the nearest exit.  The two slipped through the crowd as easily as a hot knife through butter.  Sam guessed Twix was using what Dean would no doubt call freaky mind powers to persuade people to move out of their path.  Certainly he could feel the god’s power prickling his skin like static where Twix was still grasping his arm.

They didn’t speak again until they reached the dark silence that shrouded the back of the theatre on Deck Five.  Twix, or should that be Xolotl, finally released Sam and moved away to sit down on a large packing case. He gestured for Sam to do the same but Sam shook his head.  He preferred to stay on his feet, ready to move.  He felt vulnerable enough as it was, dressed like this and armed with only a small knife made of volcanic glass.  He wished he’d thought to conceal at least one steel knife in the top of one of his boots.  It probably wouldn’t have been effective against a god but it would have made him feel a bit better.

“We’ve established that you recognised my brother’s presence in Dean’s tattoo, but hadn’t yet worked out that I was involved.  So who were you looking for in the ballroom tonight?”

“Does it matter?”

“I suppose not,” Xolotl acknowledged the point and moved on.  “I think I owe you an explanation.  I have been searching for centuries for a way to restore my brother to himself. Quetzalcoatl suffered greatly when the Christians came.  I and the other gods diminished and faded as our worshippers lost most of their beliefs, but several of us survived because although they called us by different names, our roles still existed and fear of us was deep-rooted.  My power lies in the storms and in death, and that doesn’t change.  But my brother was the god of resurrection, and as such could not exist side by side with your Jesucristo.  His position was usurped and I nearly lost him entirely.”

Sam bit his lip.  He knew he should just kill this god who was responsible for so many deaths, but Dean had less than a year to live, which meant Sam had less than a year to find a way to save his brother from the Pit.  A god with powers of resurrection might just offer a way out for Dean.  Added to that, Xolotl was trying to save his own brother too.  Sam could recognise the hint of desperation on Xolotl’s face because it was a mirror of his own.  A tiny voice was asking him, what was the difference between them?  What wouldn’t Sam do to save Dean?  He had no answer, but the dilemma kept his hand off the obsidian knife.

“The tattoo?”

“Yes.  Quetzalcoatl was dying, but his powers of resurrection were still there.  I managed to harness enough to capture his essence in the ink of a tattoo on the skin of one of my faithful worshippers, and I have nurtured that essence ever since.  Moving from host to host, transferring by the power of life and reproduction, and gaining a little more strength with each transfer.  Now I think my brother has sufficient vitality to be able to regenerate in his own form, with Dean’s help.”

“And just how would that help Dean get out of his deal?”

“If my brother were to share some of his essence with Dean, your brother’s human body would become impossible to kill.”

“Dean would be invulnerable?”

“Not invulnerable, no.  He could be harmed, but he would not die.  Quetzalcoatl’s power would resurrect him if his body was close to death.”

Sam was pacing now, unable to keep still.  The hope he was feeling was like too much caffeine, the stimulation making his heart race.  He hadn’t forgotten the trail of death that had led Xolotl to this moment, but the withered hearts of the previous victims faded into the background, pushed aside by the heady picture of Dean staying with him, by Sam’s side where he belonged, forever.

 _What’s dead should stay dead, Sammy_ , said Dean’s voice inside his head. Sam huffed out a bitter laugh.  _Yeah, right, Dean.  That’s why you brought me back too, hey?_ He told himself he was just gathering information, not making a decision, but he knew it was a lie.  If this had any chance of succeeding, he was going to try it.  He had to.

“How would this work?”

Xolotl unsuccessfully tried to conceal a triumphant smile, and Sam winced internally.  He might save Dean from Hell by doing this, but he was pretty certain he was probably damning himself at the same time.  
Xolotl explained the process and Sam acquiesced.  The first step, Xolotl said, was to bring Dean here to perform the ritual to revive Quetzalcoatl.  Sam nodded slowly and made to leave to fetch his brother, but Xolotl halted him with a gesture.

“No need to go anywhere, Sam Winchester.  Quetzalcoatl has brought your brother to us.”

Sam’s head whipped around so fast he heard a vertebrae crack.  Sure enough, there was Dean entering the backstage area, looking wobbly as a new-born foal.  At some point Dean had gotten dressed again.  He was in the same black outfit he’d been wearing earlier, minus the wig.  His face was pale under the still smudged makeup.  His eyes were open but his expression was dazed and unfocussed.  Sam didn’t think Dean even saw him standing in the shadows as he came to a halt in front of the god of thunder.

0x0x0x0x0

“Strip.”  Twix said.

Dean’s hands were moving before his brain even registered the instruction.  Vaguely he understood that somehow he was under a compulsion, but he didn’t have the strength to resist.  The dress unfastened, slipping to the floor to pool around his feet. The padding followed, leaving Dean standing in his drag queen underwear, swaying on his six inch heels.  If he’d been able to feel anything, he’d have been embarrassed about how slutty he must’ve looked, in just stockings and garter and camisole.  His wig was gone and his short hair was plastered to his skull with sweat.

The buzzing inside Dean’s head got louder and his skin was almost fizzing, it was tingling so badly.  He couldn’t think straight. Then Twix put his hand on Dean’s chest, right over his heart and the curse exploded into life inside him.

“Brother,” Twix said. “Quetzalcoatl.”

Twix’s voice crackled like electricity, and Dean was filled with horror as he felt the snake becoming fully aware under his skin. His whole body was shuddering beyond his ability to control it, and he found himself dropping to the floor on his hands and knees.  The snake was moving, its tongue flicking in and out as its feathered head slid up around his pectoral muscle.  Then all concerns about it reaching his heart fled when he felt its muscular tail extend down his spine and its tip parted his buttocks.

Oh hell no.

No way was he going to star in some sick Japanese Hentai porn while some monster-dude watched and got his rocks off.  Dean started to struggle in earnest, but it was hopeless.  Quetzalcoatl was controlling him, and the god’s snake form would not be denied. Dean shivered as the tip of the tail found his hole and started pushing inside.  He supposed he should be grateful that the god-snake-whatever was thoughtful enough to self lubricate, or this would have just ripped Dean apart.  As it was, Quetzalcoatl was sliding in as easily as it could, for a first time penetration.  Then after the first few seconds when Dean involuntarily clenched as tight as he could against the painful intrusion, the prehensile tail pushed past the first ring of muscle and was worming its way deeper into his ass.

Dean hung his head and panted for breath, trying not to think about how this must look, how _he_ must look, spilt open and unresisting.

“Quetzalcoatl, my brother, my twin.  I have waited for you so long.  I have missed you all this time. Too many years have I spent alone.” Xolotl said.

Dean wanted to groan at the excruciatingly bad dialogue, but all that came out of his mouth was a hiss that sounded like a name.  Fuck.  It looked like the ancient god had control of his tongue now too.  He was starting to feel like he’d ended up in a bad porn version of that Harry Potter film with all the snake talk and the huge python.

_Xolotl…_

When he’d toyed with the idea of letting a guy fuck him (and yeah, he had thought about it in the past), this was not how he’d imagined it going.  At some point Quetzalcoatl’s twin had lost his clothing and with it most of his resemblance to a human being.  He now had the head of a dog and though his body was a man’s, it was muscular and hirsute and oh holy shit, very erect. There was no doubt in Dean’s mind about what the god intended to do with that particular attribute, as Xolotl moved out of sight behind him.   Just when he thought his situation couldn’t get any worse, two hands grasped his hips.  Lightning shot through his bones with a crackle so loud he thought he’d gone deaf.  If he’d had control of his vocal chords he would have screamed them raw, but as it was, when the breath left his body it hissed out a different message altogether.

 _Yessssss, brother.  Join with me.  Set me free_.

Xolotl needed no encouragement. Something hard and blunt nudged at Dean’s hole where he was already stretched wide around Quetzalcoatl’s snake tail.  Oh no, no, no that was just not going to happen.  It was impossible; he couldn’t take it.  For a brief second, Dean’s desperation won out over the feathered serpent’s will, and he twisted in Xolotl’s grip to look around.  He caught a glimpse of glowing eyes and distinctly non-human teeth before his head was wrenched back to face front.  Those sharp, yellowed teeth he’d seen sank into the meat of Dean’s shoulder, holding him in place, and the dog-headed monster’s breath puffed rank in his nostrils as Xolotl shoved his dick deep into Dean.

This time he was allowed to scream.

0x0x0x0x0

It was Dean’s scream that finally released Sam from the strange paralysis that had gripped him.  This was not what he’d intended, nor what he’d discussed with Twix.  Xolotl was hurting Dean and that was unacceptable.

This was brutal and wrong, and was going to kill his brother.

Galvanised into action, Sam pulled the obsidian knife out of his bodice, silently thanking the tourist industry for having that souvenir shop on board.  Now he just had to pray that his research had been correct, and that this volcanic glass would kill both the dog-headed god, and his serpent twin.

He leapt forward, silent as a panther.

0x0x0x0x0

Dean wasn’t sure what happened next.  Everything had gotten even fuzzier after Xolotl shoved that fucking baseball bat up his ass.  He remembered finally being able to scream, and the relief he’d felt at vocalising his outrage. Then a ten-ton elephant had landed on his back, crushing him to the floor, and he’d blacked out.

He swam back to consciousness with a sense of déjà vu.  Sam was shoving his anxious puppy face into Dean’s squashed-up-on-the-floor-face, and hadn’t they done this dance already today?  Except this time Sam’s face was splashed with something red that wasn’t lipstick. In fact it looked like blood, and that was enough to wake Dean right up.  Shit.  Sam was hurt and he needed to get up to check his little brother out.

He wriggled and rolled onto his side.  Now he could get a good look at him, Dean could see that the blood Sam was covered with wasn’t his own, and for a change it didn’t seem to be Dean’s either.  All of which was good.  Feeling a bit happier, Dean managed to sit upright, then winced at the rawness as he landed his weight on his buttocks.

“Ugh, fuck.”

“Dean!”  Sam sounded ridiculously relieved, considering he usually got all po-faced if Dean swore too much.  Sam’s hands were everywhere, and Dean belatedly realised he had lost most of his clothing again.  His cheeks heated when Sam brushed over a bare nipple, and in spite of the soreness in his ass, his cock gave an interested twitch.  Oh, no, not again.

Distracted by trying to suppress all inappropriate thoughts about his brother, it was a few moments before Dean registered what Sam was saying.

“Dean, I’ve killed Xolotl, but the minute his twin died, Quetzalcoatl snapped back into the tattoo on your skin.  I think I know how to get rid of it, but um…”

“Spit it out, Sammy.”

“You aren’t going to like it.  Xolotl told me how Quetzalcoatl was transferring from body to body.  By sharing life.  Erm, seed, you know?”

Dean leaned back, shifting his weight off his ass and closing his eyes.  Until he realised the something warm and solid he was leaning on was in fact Sam, and jerked upright again.

“Just peachy,” he groaned.  “More fucking.”

“If you want, we could get someone else to do it, though I’d still have to be here to kill the serpent when it manifested…”

Dean’s eyes flew open and the look on Sam’s face almost killed him dead.  Sam was flushed bright red with embarrassment but underneath all that was an expression so lost and full of fear of rejection, Dean felt all his own misgivings slip away.  Fuck.  He was damned anyway. What difference would a little incest make?

“God no,” he said, “If anyone is doing any fucking tonight, it’s going to be you.  I wouldn’t trust anyone else.  Even though you are hung like a fucking horse.”

If anything, Sam’s blush deepened, but Dean was happy to see that other vulnerable look fade into a shy grin.  Now they just needed to find something to use as lube, because no way was he letting anything else be shoved into his body without greasing the way as thoroughly as he’d grease Baby’s engine.  He reckoned it was about time his body had some tender loving care, and who better to give it to him than Sam?

0x0x0x0x0

_Half a tub of Vaseline and some time later…_

“Just fucking fuck me already will you? Fuck!”

“Why, you sweet-talker.  I hope you are a bit more eloquent with the girls, Dean.” Sam was grinning, Dean could hear it in his voice.  His brother was enjoying this a little too much, Dean thought.

“Fuck you!”

“Mmmm, I rather thought it was the other way round,” Sam said, as the head of his cock pushed in, and Dean was abruptly lost for words, though he did manage a loud and pained groan that was, disturbingly, echoed by Sam.

“God.  Dean, so tight…uh…”

Dean felt a perverse sense of satisfaction that he didn’t seem to be the only one struggling for words. In fact, his brain seemed to want to babble nothing but nonsense now, possibly trying to take his mind off the fact his little brother was fucking him up the ass.

“Just keep your mind on the job, Sammy,” he wheezed, as he waited for Sam’s next move with some trepidation.  He still wasn’t convinced that huge monster his brother called his dick was going to fit, however much lube was used.

“God, why do gay guys think this is such a good idea?  I mean, there’s no way your gigantic cock is gonna fi…fuck!”

That last came out as an undignified squeak as Sam’s hips jerked and the aforementioned monster cock shoved inside another couple of inches.  Dean dropped his forehead down onto his forearms and panted like a woman in labour while Sam’s sweat dripped onto his back.  Was it his imagination or could he hear something sizzling where the moisture hit his skin?

“Shit, Sammy, this had better fucking work.  I don’t want to die impaled on my little brother’s dick.  It’s just not dignified.”

“Christ, Dean.  Are you always this mouthy when you have sex?”

Sam shifted slightly, causing Dean to give out another involuntary moan.  He twisted his head to give Sam his best scornful look.  “Oh yes, I always scream and beg when I’m on my hands and knees having incestuous butt-sex with my brother, because, you know, I do this all the fucking time…Oh man, will you just give it to me, please? It can’t hurt worse than a dislocated shoulder or a bullet wound, or a were cat’s claws, right?”

“Dean, if you’d just relax a little and let me…” Sam put one large hand onto Dean’s hip to hold him steady, and that was all the warning Dean got before Sam was thrusting right in.  Dean might have been shocked to feel Sam’s balls slap up against his ass, if it wasn’t for the fact that Sam’s dick had just ignited something deep inside his anus that had fireworks going off in every nerve-ending in his body.  All the breath seemed to have been punched out of him so he couldn’t even cry out as Sam pulled back, thrust forward and …Holy Fuck! Did it again. And again.

Guess that explained why gay sex was so popular after all. The joys of the prostate hadn’t been overstated. Dean’s body jumped involuntarily as Sam stroked over his prostate again, Dean’s dick jerking in sympathy, while leaking pre-come onto the polished wooden floor.

Sam was getting into a rhythm now, and Dean was absolutely on board with that idea. His own dick, that had been distinctly unimpressed with proceedings up till now was suddenly hard enough to punch holes in the floor and was aching for some attention.  Dean wanted to oblige but his arms were busy trying not to turn into jello from supporting his weight, while his thighs burned from attempting to thrust back onto Sam’s glorious magic healing-cock.  Actually, right now, Dean didn’t really care if the healing cock thing was a complete fallacy. His whole world had narrowed down to the heady rush of blood that was throbbing through him in time with every thrust Sam made. It was pure and exhilarating, and nothing that it should have been.

Dean was drowning, and he didn’t care.

“Oh crap, it’s coming…” Sam said.  It took Dean a few moments to realise Sam had said ‘ _it_ ’ not ‘ _I’m_ ’, and a couple more precious seconds to remember what they were actually there for, and the real reason they were having sex.  With each other.

Then he felt it, like Sam had said.  The tattoo – no, _Quetzalcoatl_ \- was moving.  In a prickle and brush of feathers on his skin, the serpent wormed away from where it had been coiled around his heart, and began making its way up around his shoulder and down his back,  towards where he and Sam were joined.  Sam wasn’t letting up and Dean thought if Sam came, _when_ Sam came, that would be when Quetzalcoatl could make the leap, would somehow transfer from his body to Sam’s.  It would start trying to take over his little brother’s body like the god had been trying to possess Dean.  Now Dean’s breathing got thicker, harsher, more strained, not because of the pounding Sam was giving him, but from sheer fear.

He couldn’t have said what it was that scared him the most.  That they’d succeed in ganking this ancient god of life and resurrection that he was busy blaming for the overwhelming lust he was feeling, leaving him with no screen between his illicit desires and his conscience.  Or that they would fail, and Sam would be hurt, or dead again, or perhaps worse, not Sam any more.

 It didn’t occur to him to fear that he might die.  In some ways, Dean thought of himself as already dead.

0x0x0x0

It was hard to concentrate on the task at hand when Sam had Dean clenched around him like this.  His brother was so fucking beautiful spread open and willing, and even though Dean’s hole was already stretched from the earlier penetrations, it was still hot and tight and perfect around Sam’s cock.  Because it was Dean, and Sam had dreamed about this for longer than he would ever acknowledge.

Sam had been gentle but thorough while prepping Dean, and not just because he wanted to make each moment he could caress his brother’s soft skin last as long as possible.  Stroking his hands down Dean’s flanks and finally being allowed to linger over the smooth firm curve of Dean’s ass was blissful enough, but the first time he sank a long finger into the furled muscle of Dean’s hole was just amazing.  Feeling the heat of Dean’s body and the way the muscles fluttered against the intrusion had Sam on the verge of coming before they had even started.  He’d had to grip the base of his cock hard to get himself back under control.  And remind himself that this was important, was about more than ‘just’ sex; as if sex with Dean could ever be ‘just’ anything.

He could hear the apprehension and the uncertainty underneath Dean’s bluster.  Sam could always see right through Dean’s defences when he was brave enough to let his own barriers down.  Sam hadn’t needed his Psychology classes at Stanford to tell him why he had built up so many walls between himself and Dean over the years, just like he didn’t need anyone else’s analysis of why they were all crumbling now.

He slicked up his cock and kept his eyes open when he pushed into Dean because he didn’t want to miss a single moment.  He wanted to smell the sweat, see, taste and touch, and most of all he wanted to hear Dean coming apart as he thrust deeper, buried himself inside his brother as if the act of fucking could blend them into a single focused soul.

When Quetzalcoatl awoke, Sam was almost too far gone to notice, and the feathered god had reached the dip in Dean’s back before Sam pulled himself back from the brink, and in a panic groped for the black knife, still slippery with Xolotl’s blood.

Dean’s body was quivering under him as Quetzalcoatl reared up from Dean’s spine, its form solidifying into a sinuous deadly head, jaws open wide and hissing.  Sam didn’t hesitate.  With one movement, he thrust both knife and dick home, the one into Quetzalcoatl’s sinewy neck, the other into his brother.  Sam came with a shout, spurting hot come deep inside Dean while the ancient snake god splintered into nothingness along with the black glass of the knife.

 _Well, that felt suitably climactic_ , Sam thought, as his body juddered against Dean’s thighs, Dean clenching around his dick, milking every last drop out of him.  He hoped Dean had got off as well, because he was really too wrung out to take care of his brother for the next decade or so.  Sam slumped forward and draped himself around Dean’s warm back, snuffling something into Dean’s ear which might have been ‘love you’ but was safely unintelligible.

Yeah.  The job was done.  Any regrets at maybe losing a chance to save Dean, the fear and sense of urgency, it had all faded into the background for a while, overlaid with a pleasant buzz of contentment.  Sam was too fucked out and yeah, happy even, to do anything except allow his exhaustion to claim him.  He was sure worry would have its pound of flesh soon enough.

0x0x0x0

Sam was nursing the horrible green cocktail Dean had bought him earlier, while anxiously scanning the room for his missing brother.

Dean had been shifty and evasive in the two days since they’d killed Quetzalcoatl, and Sam didn’t like it.  Although Dean appeared to be relaxed about what had happened between them, Sam was anxious and on edge.  He was sure if they hadn’t been trapped aboard the cruise ship for another three days, Dean would have done a runner by now.  Sam couldn’t believe Dean wasn’t a nuclear meltdown waiting to happen, as soon as the full implications of their incestuous god-killing exploits hit home.

Now Dean had disappeared for what felt like hours after saying he was just hitting the head, leaving Sam alone propping up the bar and fending off advances.  There were far too many amorous queens around for comfort and Sam made a very obvious target with his broad shoulders and height. Even out of costume, the Winchester boys seemed to be a hit with the Courtiers. At first Sam was too busy giving the latest one the firm brush off to notice that the stage was occupied by someone new, and more to the point, someone who wasn’t totally awful.  Tonight was open mike night, and so far the number who’d chosen to sing bad karaoke had been excruciating.

When his current companion stopped talking to Sam and started staring open-mouthed at the figure in the spotlight, Sam finally started paying attention as the beautifully mellow tenor voice filtered through the microphone.

_He's home again from another day_  
She smiles at him as he walks through the door  
She wonders if it will be okay  
It's hard for her when he doesn't respond 

_He says babe you look a mess_  
You look dowdy in that dress  
It's just not like it used to be  
Then she says... 

 

“Wow,” said the sparkly pink lip-sticked Queen leaning on Sam’s arm. “It’s Raquel!  I never thought I’d see her on stage again!  How fabulous!”

But her words faded into insignificance and all Sam’s attention was honing in on the stage, because Russell had stopped singing the opening bars and another voice, rough and husky, far less tuneful and a hundred times more familiar, had taken up the song’s refrain.

_I may not be a lady_  
But I'm All Woman  
From Monday to Sunday I work harder than you know  
I'm no classy lady  
But I'm All Woman  
And the woman needs a little love to make her strong  
You're not the only one 

 

Sam’s stomach flipped as the spotlight swung across the darkness to highlight Dean.  His brother had on a plain sheath dress that clung at the hips and did nothing to hide the muscular, masculine breadth of Dean’s shoulders.  He had a wig on, one that gave him a soft bob that framed his fine cheekbones without making him look like anyone other than himself.  His face was very simply made up, just some kohl accentuating his huge eyes, lip-gloss giving them a sheen under the lights that made them look just-kissed, and god, but Sam wanted to.  Very much.  The strength of the feeling that swept over him came as a total surprise.

Sam blinked as the spotlight switched over to Russell as the queen of drag queens’ turn to take over the song came again.  Dean’s after-image was burned into Sam’s retinas as if he could still see him standing there in the dark, with those high-heeled pumps emphasising Dean’s muscular calves and the bow of his legs.  When the chorus came round, and Dean’s voice kicked in.  Sam knew Dean was looking right at him, was singing just for him.  His crazy, macho, utterly masculine brother wanted to tell the whole freaking world how he was all woman for Sam, and Sam was on his feet without a thought in his head other than he wanted Dean.

He was weaving his way through the small tables with their candles and white tablecloths, overwhelmed by this huge wave of affection and love, and determination and lust, all mixed up together into some sort of heady cocktail of emotions that meant he didn’t have a second thought about stepping onto the dark part of the stage where he’d last seen Dean standing.  His blood was thrumming so loud he could barely hear Russell singing his part of the song, but when Dean’s turn came round again, his brother’s voice up close coming out of the deep dark just before the light hit him?  Well, that he heard with his whole body.  Dean’s voice was gravelly and intoxicating and vibrated through Sam’s soul like undertow moving shingle down a shore.

_You'll always be a lady_  
Cause You're All Woman  
From Monday to Sunday I love you much more than you know  
You're a classy lady  
Cause You're All Woman  
This woman needs a loving man to keep her warm… 

 

Then Sam was reaching for Dean and pulling him off the stage, to a cacophony of cheers and catcalls, whoops and whistles, leaving a grinning Russell to finish off the musical entertainment on his own.

Sam had other more entertaining prospects in mind.

  
**The End**

If you are wondering about Dean's song All Woman - you can watch Lisa Stansfield performing it on Youtube  


**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my two excellent betas dragonlit and keep_waking_up for all your help and advice. Hopefully I’ve got rid of all the errors you spotted and only introduced a minimum of new ones! I did actually do some research and the New York drag queen outfitters I mention does actually exist (though they don't sell shoes...). I've never been inside so all of that is pure fantasy - I hope the proprietors of Planet Pepper won't mind me using them as inspiration for those scenes.
> 
> The song quoted at the end is Lisa Stansfield's All Woman.


End file.
